ceiling bill this week. but republicans increasingly believe that the $1.2 trillion in automatic spending cuts in the sequester are going to happen come march 1st. >> we think these sequesters will happen, because the democrats have opposed our efforts to replace those cuts with others and they've offered no alternatives. >> house speaker john boehner recently told "the wall street journal" that the sequester, quote, is as much leverage as we're going to get. but does the gop actually stand to lose more than it gains? i'm joined by "washington post" columnist, and msnbc policy analyst, ezra klein, who has written about this. good morning, ezra. >> good morning. >> in one of your columns, you wrote that republicans are wrong to think that the sequester gives them leverage. what's your reasoning? >> it's just become a somewhat bizarre conversation. look, you have to go back. the sequester, it's a very weird, kind of boring word. it comes out of the debt ceiling deal in 2011 and it was the backup to the superco